He compares venial sin to the diamond which was thought by its presence to
prevent the loadstone from attracting iron. A soul attached to venial sin
is retarded in its progress in the path of justice, but when the hindrance
is removed God dilates the heart and makes it to run in the way of His
commandments.
You ask me if a great number of venial sins can ever make up a mortal one,
and consequently cause us to lose the grace of God.
No, indeed! Not all the venial sins which ever existed could make one
mortal sin: but nevertheless, not many venial sins are needed to dispose
us to commit a mortal one, as it is written that _he that contemneth small
things shall fall by little and little,[1] and that he who loves danger
shall perish in it_.[2]
For, according to the maxim of St. Bernard, received by all spiritual
writers, not to advance in the way of God is to fall back, not to sow with
Him is to scatter, not to gather up is to lose, not to build is to pull
down, not to be for God is to be against Him, not to reap with Him is to
lay waste. Now to commit a venial sin is essentially a not working with
God, though it may not be a positive working against Him.
"Charity," says our Blessed Father, "being an active quality cannot be long
without either acting or dying: it is, say the early Fathers, symbolized
by Rachel. _Give me children_, she said to her husband, _otherwise I shall
die_.[3] Thus charity urges the heart which she has espoused to make her
fertile in good works; otherwise she will perish."
Venial sin, especially when the soul clings to it, makes us run the risk of
losing charity, because it exposes us to the danger of committing mortal
sin, by which alone charity is driven forth and banished from the soul. On
this subject our Blessed Father, in the chapter from which we have already
quoted, speaks as follows: "Neither venial sin, nor even the affection to
it, is contrary to the essential resolution of charity, which is to prefer
God before all things; because by this sin we love something outside reason
but not against reason. We make too much and more than is fit of creatures,
yet we do not positively prefer them before the Creator. We occupy
ourselves more than we ought in earthly things; yet we do not, for all
that, forsake heavenly things.
"In fine, venial sin impedes us in the way of charity, but does not put us
out of it, and, therefore, venial sin, not being contrary to charity, never
destroys charity either wholly or partially."
Further on he says: "However, venial sin is sin, and consequently it
troubles charity, not as a thing that is contrary to charity itself, but as
being contrary to its operations and progress and even to its intention.
For, as this intention is that we should direct all our actions to God, it
is violated by venial sin, which is the referring of an action to something
outside of God and of the divine will."
[Footnote 1: Eccle. iii. 27.]
[Footnote 2: Id. iii. 27.]
[Footnote 3: _The Love of God_. Book iv. chap. 2.]